1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a light emitting apparatus installed in a small-scale electronic instrument such as a mobile phone with a camera, or the like.
2. Description of Related Art
Many recent mobile phones, in addition to containing a light emitting device used for photographing still or motion pictures, are also provided with a light emitting section configured to inform the user of incoming calls or mails and to indicate talking on phone by means of a flashing or lighting a single color of light or different-colored light. Also, in recent years, proposals have been made related to a stroboscopic mechanism to emit flash light for photography installed in mobile phones.
For the mobile phones provided with functions mentioned above, it is necessary to mount an LED for indication of incoming calls etc in a different place from the white LED for flash light.
An example of a known conventional mobile phone with a camera is shown in FIG. 11.
The mobile phone 71 as shown in FIG. 11 includes a case 72 having an upper case 72a and a lower case 72b and is of a folded type in which the case is folded into two. The upper case 72a is provided with a camera lens 74 for photography, a strobe-light emitting section 75 for emitting flash light, and a light emitting section 76 configured to inform the user of incoming calls etc.
Generally, a white LED is used as the flash light source in the strobe-light emitting section 75 and a blue LED is used as the indication light source in the light emitting section 76. Furthermore, a supplementary display section 77 having a screen which is located outside in the folded state and an antenna 78 for sending and receiving are provided on the upper case 72a (see FIG. 11).
Another example of a known conventional mobile phone with a camera is shown in FIG. 12 (see, for reference, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2004-23412, pages 3 to 5, FIG. 1).
The mobile phone 80 as shown in FIG. 12 includes a photographic lens 81. A plurality of ring lights 84 are arranged peripherally of the photographic lens 81. The ring lights 84 comprise three-colored LEDs 82 which are arranged in a ring shape and which are configured to emit red light, blue light and green light. In this way, white light is acquired by emission of light of all three colors from the lighted LEDs 82. The emitted white light is used as a flash light for photography.
At the same time, it is possible to inform incoming calls etc. by blinking each selected color of the three-colored LEDs 82.
However, in the mobile phone 71 as shown in FIG. 11, because the strobe-light emitting section 75 and the light emitting section 76 are disposed independently at places separate from each other, a plurality of LEDs are required for each light source.
On the other hand, in the mobile phone 80 as shown in FIG. 12, because a plurality of LEDs, each of which emits either red light, blue light or green light are required, the number of LEDs increases and a large area is required for mounting the LEDs.
In this way, there are problems of large size, heavy weight and high cost for a mobile phone with multiple functions mentioned above.